The Cassette Player
by turtledork
Summary: SA It was just another day - him sprawled on his bed as his cassette switched from side to side, and her standing by the doorway.


**The Cassette Player**

_It was just another day - him sprawled on his bed as his cassette switched from side to side, and her standing by the doorway._

A/N: I don't own Neon Genesis Evangelion. In fact, I only watched it for the first time 2 days ago. However, I've fallen in love with the push and pull of Shinji and Asuka's relationship. I haven't written fanfic for a long long time :D so go easy on me? Oh, and this is set sometime in the middle of the series.

* * *

He likes listening to orchestras and classical music, especially the sound of the cello. With each note, he sees the bow against the strings, the twitch of fingers, and the movement of the wrist. He likes to think he is the man in his music, whose slender fingers weave a priceless sonata a young boy listens to in a midsummer night.

It's nearly 9 o'clock and Misato is not home yet. His room lights are dimmed and he's lying down on his futon, earphones plugged in. One of Bach's Cello Suites is playing from the cassette and he pretends, with his fingers in the air, that between his hand and his chest, there is a cello.

Shinji Ikari, who is but didn't really want to be the pilot of Evangelion Unit 01, and a cello. He thought it had a nice ring to it. Caught up in his faux cello-playing, he almost didn't realize that the song had ended.

He couldn't help but smile to himself as he heard the whirring of the tape inside of his player as it switched to the next side. It was a peaceful midsummer night. There were no emergency alerts, no need to slip in a plugsuit, and no need to battle what was known as Angels. It was pleasant.

Before the music started playing again, he thought of a moment between him, his cello, and Asuka Langley Sohryu. On that day, she said that he might have not been all that useless, that he might have been better. For some reason, he thought that this day was a lot like that.

When he shut his eyes to listen to Bach, he saw red. He didn't really know why.

* * *

It was a quiet midsummer night in Misato Katsurugi's apartment, and she didn't like it.

The small apartment that she never really grew comfortable with was dark, apart from a solitary light in the kitchen and the moonlight from the window. Misato was not home yet and Shinji as per usual was cooped up in his own room and his own universe.

Asuka Langley Sohryu rarely felt that she belonged. And Tokyo-3 was no exception. For a fast-paced girl like her who didn't know the meaning of the word stop, the idle lives of Tokyo-3 residents, despite Apocalypse looming over their heads, rubbed her the wrong way. Days like this emphasized that fact.

She passes his room on the way back from getting a drink of water from the kitchen. She catches a glimpse of him sprawled on his bed, spots the beads of sweat on the side of his face, and lingers for a while as 9:00 turned to 9:05.

On this quiet midsummer night with nothing to do, she watched Ikari Shinji with his hands in the air, weaving a faux concerto for a non-existent audience.

She wouldn't say she was mesmerized. She definitely wouldn't say she was impressed. But even though she wouldn't ever admit it, her eyes were caught - even just a little.

She didn't know why though.

* * *

She notices that he keeps on listening to the same tape over and over. That classical music tape with the cellos.

"Don't you ever get tired of listening to the same thing over and over again?" It's a little uncharacteristic of her to ask Shinji about anything. It's very much in her personality to nag and meddle in people's lives though. And that justifies this, she thinks.

Ikari Shinji pulls an earphone from his ear and tucks it behind. He's quiet for a bit, and looks from his cassette player to the red-haired girl in front of him. He's not entirely sure what to say for her to be satisfied, and that's why it takes him a while to answer.

"I like it. This tape. It's the only one I have."

Asuka Langley Sohryu looks at him with an arched brow and arms crossed over her chest. She's a little irritated, and a little uneasy, and she's not really sure why.

"You're so dull, Baka-Shinji!" she exclaims as she hits him over his head.

"Well, you should mind your own business!" He snaps in mild irritation as he felt the faint throbbing from the top of his head.

That was the end of the conversation as Asuka, being Asuka, probably bored of the conversation, ambled away to the living room. It was always like this. Asuka was like a pinball darting from one direction to another, and he's gotten used to it, for the most part.

As he watched her from the corner of his eye, trying to dig out the remote control from whatever crevice it was buried in the couch, he felt a little lonely.

And he'd like to say that he didn't know why, but he did.

* * *

Kaji takes her out shopping and she can't help but get a little excited. She even put on clothes for women even though Kaji calls her a young lady. When Kaji asks about what she's wearing, she attributes it all to the heat of that fine summer day. He leaves it at that, and makes no other comment.

She's a little disappointed when Kaji takes her to a music store - something he has to check, he says.

With nothing else to do, she finds herself scanning through titles of cassettes. She comes across the word "Bach", "Cello", and "Concerto", and for some reason, she remembers Shinji's fingers, holding a bow against a cello.

She looks through the titles for something that sounds appropriate and picks it out. As she places it on the counter and puts a couple of bills on its surface, she thinks of Shinji and what kind of goofy smile he would have if he were to receive something.

On the way out, Kaji asks about the tape she's bought and comments on how he didn't know she liked classical music. Asuka shrugs at this and tells him she just felt like it, and that it was nothing. Because that's what it was. Nothing.

She's really glad Kaji doesn't know that Shinji plays the cello.

* * *

Shinji wakes up earliest among the people in the apartment. And though they have a timetable for chores posted up by the kitchen, it is almost always him that ends up preparing breakfast.

That morning, as he stretched his arms, and slowly made his way to the kitchen, he spotted something atop the kitchen table. It was rectangular, a cassette case, with a lopsided post-it stuck on it.

_Because you're pathetic._

It didn't really take a rocket scientist to figure that one out. Cautiously, he peeled off the post-it, and was pleasantly surprised by the title. He made a quick trip back to his room, grabbed his player, and then placed the tape inside. A familiar yet unfamiliar sound entered his ears and he smiled. It was pleasant.

That morning, as Ikari Shinji made breakfast for Katsurugi Misato and Sohryu Asuka Langley, he hummed the tune of a sonata he only recently discovered.

On the way to the comfort room to do her morning rituals, Sohryu Asuka Langley caught a glimpse of him, and smiled to herself for a good 10 seconds before shouting out an order involving making something other than eggs and toast for breakfast.

He never really got to say thank you. She never made it clear that she was the one that gave it to him. But the next morning, she was greeted by the sweet smell of maple syrup, a plate of homemade pancakes, and Shinji in an apron with a sheepish smile.

**END**


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